Chapter 153: Chapter 157: The Captain’s Big Shopping Spree
Dengken spoke the truth—he really had run off to a store near the Cross District to buy a bicycle for Nina after parting ways with Sherry.
By the way, he was doing something he had planned long ago but had kept putting off until today due to various things: opening a bank account for himself.
Inside the Plunder City-State Bank, Dengken was waiting for a clerk to finish preparing the last form for him; the waiting process was boring, so he turned his attention to observing his surroundings.
Perhaps because it wasn’t a day off, and there weren’t many citizens from the Lower City District who needed to conduct bank business, this rather small bank lobby seemed quite tranquil. Three out of the five service windows were idle, with staff in black uniforms chatting behind them, while the bright lights shone on the counter glass, casting a lazily gleaming halo.
Dengken looked up and saw long iron pipes extending near those counters, the pipes running up to the ceiling like slender pillars and arranged neatly above, stretching to some place behind the hall. A low, rhythmic clacking sound came from the floor beneath, as if some mechanical device was operating underground.
Finally, the clerk prepared the last item on the form and handed it to Dengken, saying as a matter of routine, “After confirming everything is correct, sign at the end. There are your account and seal pattern. The service fee for a bearer account is 6 sollars and 5 besols.”
Taking the form, Dengken curiously examined its contents and spontaneously conceived numerous speculations about the civilization and economic systems of this world’s city-states. However, as he wasn’t an expert in this field, after musing for a moment, he focused on the end of the form—remembering the short string of numbers at the top, he signed his name and handed over the form with the service fee.
The clerk took the form, glanced at it casually, and then placed it into a punch machine. Accompanied by a brisk clack, the punch machine created a dazzling array of holes in the blank frame on the edge of the form, and then the clerk rolled up the paper, stuffed it into a metal tube, and dropped it into one of the pipes next to the counter.
The sound of metal clashing was heard, followed by the closing of the pipe, and the hiss of steam pressurizing, along with the sound of an object rapidly sliding through the pipe reached Dengken’s ears. As he followed the sound with his eyes upward, he noticed a slight tremor in one of the pipes connected to the ceiling—that document had been sent to some remote place.
“Just wait a moment,” said the clerk behind the counter offhandedly, “if the pipes aren’t faulty today and the machines on the other side are in good condition, you should get your receipt within half an hour—if that fault light over there turns on, though, you’ll have to come back tomorrow.”
An extraordinary process.
For Dengken, none of this was very efficient, but for this world, it represented the pinnacle of progress that city-state civilization had striven to develop since the advent of the Deep Sea Era.
He watched all of this with both curiosity and emotion, and at the same time, he overheard a conversation between clerks—at the counter next to him, a young man was exclaiming, “I hear that the Academy of Truth is in touch with the head office, saying they want to install some new machine that could increase the head office’s processing efficiency by several times…”
“That’s called a large difference engine—Moco’s city-state banks have been using them for a while. Actually, there are some in Plunder City, too—a few smaller ones at the tax office and the mathematics research institute, and even in the cathedral I heard they’re used to manage archives,” the clerk sitting across from Dengken chimed in nonchalantly, “if you ask me, the head office is just now thinking of this, it’s already ridiculously behind the times.”
“That doesn’t really concern us,” another idle clerk joined the conversation, “That thing is both expensive and cumbersome. Including the steam core that acts as a power source, along with the matching punch machine, and an analyzer, a whole difference engine set could fill this entire hall…”
“I heard that the Academy of Truth is also organizing people to study the next generation of difference engines? It seems they can be half the size, with performance not far off from the current large machines, and run on electric power instead…”
“Electricity? Without a steam core? What if the machine gets possessed while operating? That thing needs to continuously process a huge amount of data; without the sacred protection of steam, the bearings and gear assemblies are way too susceptible to attracting evil spirits, aren’t they?”
“How would I know… Maybe there needs to be a pastor standing next to it, doing mass with incense for the machine while it calculates…”
“…Then it feels like the miniaturization hasn’t saved much trouble, but instead takes up an additional clergyman…”
“Hey, how much space does a pastor take, and how much does half a difference engine take? Do you know how expensive the downtown property prices are…”
It seems that no matter the world, people’s idle chitchat while slacking at work is just as wild and aimless. The bank clerks’ topics soon shifted from difference engines to city-state housing prices, but on the other hand, their casual conversation was so peculiar and interesting to Dengken—he was so engrossed that he even forgot the boredom of waiting.
But this idle chat didn’t last long; following a clang in a nearby transfer pipe, everyone’s discussion about “whether housing prices or pastors are more expensive” was finally cut off.
The clerk opposite Dengken opened the brass pipe next to the counter and pulled out a metal small tube—this one was obviously a different model from the one sent earlier, seeming sturdier, with a complex locking mechanism at the seal. It took quite some effort with a special tool for the clerk to open the lid and retrieve the item inside.
It was a rectangular metal plate no larger than half a palm, stamped with letters and symbols, the edges dotted with randomly arranged holes of various sizes. The series of numbers that Dengken had just memorized was imprinted on one end of the plate.
“Here’s your seal card,” the clerk handed the metal plate to Duncan, “You can use it at any bank in Plunder City-State or the banks of the Endless Sea Commerce Association in other city-states—but transactions in other city-states would have a delay of three to seven days, due to the transmission time for cross-sea telegraphy or Spirit Realm communications.”
“Thank you.” Duncan took the metal plate and curiously examined this artifact that seemed to represent the level of technology in the city-state civilization; he scrutinized the delicate holes, while at the bank counter, he discovered the machine that read these metal plates.
These creations, utterly different from those on Earth yet also representing humanity’s wisdom, were the “footprints” of the city-state civilization of the deep-sea era up to the present day.
“Do you need anything else?” came an inquiry from behind the counter.
“Ah… no, thank you,” Duncan came to his senses, smiled, and rose from his chair, but before leaving, he seemed to remember something abruptly, pausing in his tracks to ask offhandedly, “By the way… can machines really be possessed by evil spirits?”
“Of course, they can, what’s so strange about that?” The clerk immediately replied as if it were a question that required no contemplation on her part, “Apart from Subspace, anything in this world can be corrupted, isn’t that common knowledge?”
Duncan was taken aback; he had just asked the question in passing, but her answer, for some reason, touched his thoughts, giving him a fleeting twinkle at the bottom of his heart.
A moment later, he nodded gently: “…Indeed, apart from Subspace, anything in this world can be corrupted.”
Then he left the bank.
As per his plan, he still had a major shopping spree to undertake today—besides buying Nina a bicycle, his shopping list had a whole stack of items listed that could scare Nina out of her wits.
The income from the dagger he sold to Old Mr. Morris, together with the reward for reporting heretics, was enough to support a family of three living carefree in the Lower City District for one or two years. And since most of that money had not yet been touched, Duncan felt it was time to put it to good use.
So, for the next half-day, Duncan virtually swept through the markets and shops near the Cross District…
Around four o’clock in the afternoon, in a shadowy alley near the Cross District, Duncan clanged as he put down the last package, and he sighed with relief.
He looked at the mountain of goods before him with satisfaction.
Flour, vegetables, seeds, spices, fresh meats, cured ingredients, various dried mushrooms, wines—and cheese.
Cheese that was edible, normal, younger than him.
Moreover, there was even a pile of pots, pans, ladles, and many things “Duncan thought might be useful.”
Transporting all these items to the ship, Homeloss, would undoubtedly revolutionize its living environment.
At the very least, the kitchen would now be able to produce stable human meals.
Duncan nodded with satisfaction and casually called out, “Ai Yi!”
The fluttering sound came from above a nearby building, and Ai Yi landed neatly on his shoulder.
The next second, after glancing at the goods on the ground, the pigeon exclaimed, “You’re not messing with me, are you?”
Before the words were finished, the bird tilted and fell straight to the ground—although Duncan hadn’t yet said what he wanted it to do, this clever creature had obviously realized its predicament.
But Duncan just chuckled, catching the free-falling pigeon mid-air, “No worries, if you can’t carry it back in one go, you can make a few trips…”